The Atlantis Gene: A Thriller (43 page)

He backed his snowmobile out and resumed the way they had come, back to the site.

CHAPTER 93

Kate yawned and turned the page. The room was cold, and she and David were wrapped in a thick blanket now.

“Finish it on the walk out,” David said through sleepy eyes. “You’ll need to stop a lot.”

“Ok, I just want to get to a good stopping place,” she said.

“You stayed up reading as a kid, didn’t you?”

“About every night. You?”

“Video games.”

“Figures.”

“Sometimes legos.” David yawned again. “How many pages left?”

Kate flipped through the journal. “Not many actually. Just a few more. I can stay awake if you can.”

“Like I said, I’ve slept enough. And I don’t have a hike tomorrow.”

I awake to the soft hiss of air flowing into the tube. At first, the air feels heavy, like water in my lungs, but after a few deep gulps of the damp cold air, my breathing normalizes, and I take stock of my situation. The room is still dark, but there’s a faint shaft of light drifting into the lab from the corridor.

I rise from the tube and walk toward the corridor, surveying the room as I go. None of the other tubes are occupied, save for the ape-man, who apparently slept through the flood without incident. I wonder how many he’s slept through.

There’s still about a foot of water in the corridor. Enough to notice but not enough to slow me down. I slosh toward the jagged opening. The rocks that locked me inside are almost completely gone, washed away no doubt. A soft amber glow from above drapes the remaining rocks, which I push aside as I step out into the room.

The source of the strange light hangs thirty feet above me, at the top of the stairs. It looks like a bell, or a large pawn, with windows in the top. I eye it, trying to figure out what it is. It seems to stare back at me, the lights pulsing slowly, like a lion’s heart beating after it’s devoured a victim on the Serengeti.

I stand still, wondering if it will attack me, but nothing happens. My eyes are adjusting, and with every passing second, more of the room comes into focus. The floor is a nightmarish soup of water, ashes, dirt, and blood. At the very bottom, I see the bodies of the Moroccan miners, crushed under the rubble. Above them, Europeans lie prostrate, ripped to shreds, some burned, all mutilated by a weapon I can’t imagine. It’s not an explosion, or a gun, or a knife. And they didn’t die recently. The wounds look old. How long have I been down here?

I search the bodies, hoping to see one in particular. But Rutger isn’t here.

I rub my face. I’ve got to focus. Got to get home. Helena.

The electric car is gone. I’m weak, tired, and hungry, and at that moment, I’m not sure I will ever see daylight again, but I put one foot in front of the other and start the arduous trek out of the mine. I pump my legs as hard as they’ll go and brace for the pain, but it never touches me. I’m driven to get out of this place by a strength and fire I didn’t know I possessed.

The mine flies by in a flash, and I see the light as I hike out of the last turn of the spiral. They’ve covered the entrance to the tunnel with a white tent, or a plastic sheet of some type.

I brush the flap aside, and I’m surrounded by soldiers in gas masks and strange plastic suits. I wrestle free, but they tackle me and hold me to the floor. From the ground, I see a tall soldier stride over. Even through the bulky suit, I know who it is. Konrad Kane.

One of my captors looks up at him and speaks through the mask in a muffled voice. “He just walked out, sir.”

“Bring him,” Kane says in a deep, disembodied voice.

The men drag me deeper into the warehouse, to a series of six white tents that remind me of a field hospital. The first tent has row after row of cots, all covered in white sheets. I hear screams in the next tent. Helena.

I struggle at the men at my sides, but I’m too weak, from lack of food, from the walk out, and from whatever the tube did to me. They hold me tight, but I continue to fight.

I can hear her clearly now, at the end of the tent, behind a white curtain. I lunge for her, but the soldiers jerk me back, walking me down the row so I get a good look at the people lying dead on the skinny cots. Horror spreads over me. Lord Barton and my mother-in-law are here. Rutger. Kane’s wife. All dead. And there are others, people I don’t recognize. Scientists. Soldiers. Nurses. We pass a bed with a boy, Kane’s son. Dietrich? Dieter?

I can hear the doctors talking to Helena, and, as we move past the edge of the curtain, I see them swarming around her, injecting her with something, and holding her down.

The men hold me as I struggle. Kane turns to me. “I want you to see this, Pierce. You can watch her die like I watched Rutger and Marie die.”

They drag me closer. “What happened?” I say.

“You unleashed hell, Pierce. You could have helped us. Whatever is down there killed Rutger and half his men. The ones who managed to make it back to the surface were diseased. A plague beyond anything we could imagine. It’s devastated Gibraltar and is moving through Spain.” He pulls the white curtain back farther, revealing the entire scene: Helena tossing in a bed surrounded by three men and two women working feverishly.

I push the guards off me, and Kane holds a hand up to stop them from chasing me. I run to her, brush her hair back, and kiss her cheek, then her mouth. She’s burning up. Feeling her boiling skin terrifies me, and she must see it. She reaches out and caresses my face. “It’s ok, Patrick. It’s only the flu. Spanish Flu. It will pass.”

I look up at the doctor. His eyes dart to the ground.

A tear wells in my eye and rolls slowly onto my cheek. Helena brushes it away. “I’m so glad you’re safe. They told me you were killed in a mining accident, trying to save the Moroccans who worked for you.” She holds my face in her hand. “So brave.”

She jerks a hand to her mouth, trying to suppress the cough that shakes her whole body and the rolling hospital bed. She holds her swollen belly with the other hand, trying to keep herself from hitting the rails at the side of the bed. The cough continues for what feels like eternity. It sounds like her lungs are tearing apart.

I hold her shoulders down. “Helena…”

“I forgive you. For not telling me. I know you did it for me.”

“Don’t forgive me, please don’t.”

Another round of coughing racks her and the doctors push me out of the way. They give her oxygen, but it doesn’t seem to help.

I watch. And I cry. And Kane watches me. She kicks and fights and when her body goes limp, I turn to Kane and my voice is flat, lifeless, almost like his voice that comes from the mask. Then and there, in that makeshift Immari hospital, I make a deal with the devil.

The tears rolled down Kate’s face. She closed her eyes, and she wasn’t in the bed with David in Tibet. She was back in San Francisco, on a cold night five years ago, in a hospital bed. A gurney. They were rushing her out of the ambulance and through the hospital. Doctors and nurses shouted around her, and she was yelling at them, but they wouldn’t listen to her. She grabbed the doctor’s arm. “Save the baby, if it’s between me and the baby, save—”

The doctor pulled away from her and shouted at the burly man pushing the gurney. “OR two. Stat!”

They wheeled her faster, and the mask was over her mouth, and she fought to stay awake.

She awoke to a large, empty hospital room. She hurt all over. There were several tubes running from her arm. She reached quickly for her stomach, but she knew before her hands made contact. She pulled the gown back to reveal the long ugly scar. She buried her head in her hands and cried, for how long she didn’t know.

“Dr. Warner?”

Kate looked up, startled. Hopeful. A shy nurse stood before her. “My baby?” Kate said, her voice cracking.

The nurse’s eyes drifted down, focusing on her feet.

Kate crumbled back in the bed. The tears came in sheets now.

“Ma’am, we weren’t sure, there’s no in-case-of-emergency on file, should, is there anyone we should call? A… father.”

A flash of rage stemmed the tide of tears. The seven-month romance, the dinners, the charm. The internet entrepreneur who seemed to have it all, almost too good to be true. Not almost. The accident, the apparently faulty birth control. His disappearing act. Her decision.

“No, there’s no one to call.”

David hugged her tight and brushed the tears from her eyes.

“I’m not usually emotional,” Kate said, through the sobs. “It’s just, I… when I was in…”

“I know.” He wiped a new wave of tears from her cheek. “The scar. It’s ok.” He took the journal from her hand. “That’s enough reading for tonight. Let’s get some rest.” He pulled her down beside him, and they drifted off to sleep.

CHAPTER 94

Situation Room
Clocktower HQ
New Delhi, India

“Sir, we’re pretty sure we’ve found them,” the tech said.

“How sure?” Dorian asked.

“The two-man team on the ground, some locals told them a train came through this region.” The tech used a laser pointer to circle an area of mountains and forests on the giant screen. “The tracks are supposed to be abandoned, so it couldn’t have been cargo. And the drones spotted a monastery not far from there.”

“How far out are the drones now?”

The tech punched some keys on the laptop. “A few hours—”

“How? Jesus, we were right on top of them!”

“I’m sorry, sir, they had to refuel. They can be in the air again within the hour. But— it’s dark now. The sat image is from earlier. It will be—”

“Do the drones have infrared?”

The tech worked the keyboard. “No. What should—”

“Do
any
of the drones nearby have infrared?” Dorian snapped.

“Stand by.” Images from the computer reflected in the technician’s glasses. “Yes, a little farther out, but they can reach the target.”

“Launch them.”

Another tech ran into the command center. “We just got an eyes-only from the Antarctica operation. They’ve found an entrance.”

Dorian leaned back in the chair. “Verified?”

“They’re confirming now, but the depth and dimensions are right.”

“Are the portable nukes ready?” Dorian asked.

“Yes. Dr. Chase reports they have been retrofitted to slide inside a backpack.” The skinny man held up a sheaf of printed pages too thick to be stapled. “Chase actually sent a rather detailed report—”

“Shred it.”

The man tucked the report back under his arm. “And Dr. Grey called; he wants to talk with you about precautions at the site.”

“I’m sure. Tell him we’ll talk when I get there. I’m leaving now.” Dorian rose to leave the room.

“There’s something else, sir. Infection rates are climbing in Southeast Asia, Australia, and America.”

“Is anyone working on it yet?”

“No, we don’t think so. Or, they think it’s just a new flu strain.”

CHAPTER 95

Kate opened her sleepy eyes and studied the alcove. It wasn’t night, but it wasn’t quite morning. The first rays of sunrise peaked through the large window in the alcove, and she turned away from them, putting them off, ignoring the coming of morning. She nestled her head closer to David’s and closed her eyes.